The Persistence of Memory (Dali, 1931)

The Persistence of Memory stands as the single most reproduced Surrealist image in history, a feat achieved by its instantly recognizable melting clocks. Painted in just two hours in 1931, the 24 x 33 cm oil on canvas, now at MoMA, transforms a landscape based on Dali's native Catalan coast into a dreamscape more psychologically potent than #8's Pointillist idyll. The drooping clocks, inspired by Camembert cheese melting in the summer heat, have appeared on over 10 million pieces of merchandise since 1999, when a private collector paid $29.9 million for a 20% larger preparatory study. This painting's influence on popular culture, from films to advertising, dwarfs that of #6's print run.